Disneyland

Today we went to Disneyland. This picture is me training to be a Padawan. I am fighting Darth Vader. The show is called Jedi Academy. I liked it. 

I liked Disneyland - it's fun.We saw Tom Sawyer's Island and we saw a shack on it that looked a lot like the Shrieking Shack from Harry Potter.  

We went on Space Mountain. Space Mountain is this roller coaster where you're in a space ship and you get sent out into space, you go up twisting and turning and then you go down twist turn twist turn all the way down.  

THis is us in front of the Disney Castle. It isn't as good as it looks on TV. We walked through it to Fantasy Land, which is the world of Princesses at Disneyland. We kept seeing girls who had been princessified. 

We went to Toon Town as well. I got to break out of jail in Toon Town, go on a roller coaster and bend dubells as seen in this picture. We also went on a wild car ride where we spun and you could spn the steering wheel to make your car spin and try to keep you car still. It was fun.

We went on a ride called Splash Mountain. You went in a log on the river, then you went up chug chug chug then you went up and down and up and down again, then up and a big down with a splash in the water. That was possibly my favourite ride. 

We saw the Disney Parade. We saw Mickey Mouse and a whole lot of other Disney characters. We stayed until night and saw the fireworks. It was very late when we got home.

Los Angeles, Now and Then

Today we hit the wall.

After 21 days of straight travel and merry making, we have crashed. We slept in and spent the morning in the hotel, swimming in the pool and generally sorting outselves out a bit.

Eventually we got our act together enough to drive to the Farmer's Market for lunch. The Farmer's Market is apparently an insititution in LA and we certainly loved sitting outside and people watching for a while. We then walked next door to the Grove, LA's only outdoor mall. 

We then headed to the La Brea Tar Pits to explore the huge collection of ice age fossils pulled out of the natural asphalt pits which lie under the Beverley Hills area. We had lots of fun looking up (and up and up) at the mamoth skeletons and saw our first humming bird in the atrium garden.

We also walked in the garden around the museum, enjoying the statues of ice age animals, the active dig sites in the park and the heady smell of tar. 

We discovered that the difference between NY squirrels and LA squirrels is one of attitude as well as species. NY squirrels will take one look at you, turn their backs and get on with what they were doing. LA squirrels will take one look at you, spot the camera and pose winsomely for multiple shots. 

We ended the day walking from our hotel back to the Farmer's Market for dinner, picking up some fruit for tomorrw and heading back to crash in bed. 

Driving through the Mojave to LA

Today was our longest drive - from Death Valley to LA. We slept in a little, packed and set off out throught the Eastern side of the valley to the outskirts of the Mojave Desert. The roads through the desert were long and straight, with bends in the road signposted as though a major event were occurring. We passed through a few tiny settlements, stopping at one of the slightly larger ones (Baker) for a morning break. Robert discovered that the splendors of American culture include Starbucks in a can. So he had to try it. 

The desert continued to be fascinating, with its geological history written large across the mountains. 

At Barstowe we left the freeway on a dirt road to Calico ghost town, an abandoned silver mining town which boomed in the mid 19th century, and then crashed in the early 20th century. A few of the original buidings still stand, but most of the town is a recreation based on a fair amount of research and a teensy bit of creative license. The result is kitch but fun, just like cowboy movies. 

   

We toured the silver mine, visited the museums in the buldings and tried sasparilla root beer in the saloon. Thomas was distinctly underwhelmed by sasparilla.

Back in the car, we headed through the outskirts of LA, then throught he suburbs of LA, then through some more suburbs of LA.... Some of the freeway interchanges had 6 overpasses stacked one above the next. Each seemed to be 6 lanes wide on each side. By the time we made it to our hotel we were exhausted. We staggered out to find dinner and were very happy to find that the reports of LA's food being a cut above the usual offerings to tourists were all true. We are now officially and literally on the home stretch. 

Life in the valley

We started today early (for us) to try to beat the heat and headed out to explore the Mescite sand dunes.The light on the dunes made for interesting shadows. The sand was very dry (as you'd expect) and very fine. Thomas loved climbing the dunes and sliding down them. We all found the animal tracks fascinating and were thrilled to find the tracks of a sidewinder rattlesnake.

As the day started to heat up we went in search of shade in the canyons. In these sheltered places we saw flowers, birds and lizards.

On our way back to the ranch we stopped at the salt creek, of which we've written already, and then spent the afternoon in the swimming pool.

That evening we went to Bad Water - the lowest place in the western hemisphere. We had pizza on the salt flat while watching the sun set. On the central path, the salt had been crushed down to form a wide white path which was strangely smooth. On either side of the path, the dry earth was crusted with salt crystals, which formed tiny trees and ridges as far as you could see.  It was eerie and beautiful.

Into The Desert

This morning we managed to get a tiny bit lost in Bakersfield looking for breakfast cereal. Apparently our grasp of American grocery nomenclature is still a bit shaky, because our online search for a supermarket led us to Pepe's Mexican Meat Mart and Hair Extenstion Emporium, which we suspected might be lacking in the wholesome grains department. So we fell back on searching for the supermarket Emma uses and ended up in an area of Bakersfield that Google refused to believe existed. 

Once back on the road, we headed towards the desert. We elected to take the slightly longer but more interesting route through the southern Sierra Nevada mountains. Having driven through the northern parts of the moutains, we were expecting something vaguely Alpine, and were surprised to find rocky canyons interspersed with lush irrigated valleys. Eventually, one of the valleys suddenly ceased to be lush, the crops stopped and we got our first look at the beautifully alien Joshua Trees. 

We drove through a high pass and out on to the desert plain of the Inyo valley, which runns to the east of the Sierra Nevada range. The desert changed with each turn of the road. First pale and dusty, then drak red and stony, then dotted with small green shrubs and wildflowers, then sandy and barren. Frustratingly, very few of our photos could catch the subtle colours and shadows. 

We drove into Death Valley through a pass nearly 5,000ft above sea level, then down to Stovepipe Wells, at 5 ft above sea level on a road Thomas described as his second roller coaster ride of the trip. Stovepipe Wells is a motel, RV park and shop, which counts as a major population centre in the Valley. We stopped for icecream before pushing on to our accommodation at Furnace Creek Ranch, which is a much larger settlement consisting of a motel, an RV park, two restaurants, one bar and bizzarely, a large pool and golf course which was somewhat surreal.

We booked into our cabin, had a hasty dinner and then headed to the lookout on Zabriski Point to watch the sunset and enjoy the cool of the night. We lay on our backs and watchedthe first stars appear, before heading back for a drink on the porch and bed. 

For the Sapphires

Today we found a wetland in a desert! We are in a desert called Death Valley, which is mostly very dry, but it has a small wetland called Salt Creek. 

Salt Creek has prehistoric fish called Pup Fish. The water they live in is ultra salty and is only there from late Autumn to early Spring. The Pup Fish have to drink the water they swim in because it is too salty to absorb through the skin like other fish.

The Pup Fish are small, fast and manoeuvrable. They look like they are playing like puppies but they are really defending their territory, digging up food from the mud and mating. They can swim in water so shallow their fins stick out. 

Not many other things can live in the water. We saw algae in the water and insects and birds above it. The birds eat the fish and the insects. Coyotes and Sidewinder Rattlesnakes eat the birds. 

Most of the desert is stony and bare, but around the creek there was a tough plant called Picklebush.

Giants in the snow

In planning our trip, we had been disappointed to find that all of our options for seeing giant sequoias were inaccessible due to snow, so it was very excting to learn that the road to the mariposa grove had been cleared and opened just in time for our designated big tree day. We packed up, said goodbye to the river tumbling past our balcony and drove into Yosemite for the last time. After a brief stop at the lookout above Bridal Falls to say goodbye to the valley, we drove through a tunnel in the mountain to the road leading to the Mariposa Grove in the south of the park. The drive took us up to 6000ft, past the Badger ski area. There was a surprising amount of snow about, and it was obvious that the road had only just been cleared. We drove into the Grove and spent a lovely morning walking among the giant sequoias. Another day of saying 'wow'.   

The snow made the forest quite magic. Thomas thought that it would make a perfect Christmas card, if you added robins and deleted some of the burnt trees (Sequoias need to germinate through fire - very familiar). We heard woodpeckers in the distance and saw spotted squirrels. After an impromptu picnic lunch in the car park we drove down out of the park and out of the mountains on to the flat farmland of the San Joaquim valley. We spent the afternoon driving towards Bakersville. We had a very American moment in Fresno when we stopped at a Starbucks to stretch our legs, only to find that it was a drive through. Never mind, this is the US, so there was another Starbucks three blocks away. We arrived in Bakersfield in the evening and had dinner in the diner next door. There was pie. It was good. Returning to civilisation meant a return to wifi, and thus some extensive catch up blogging. Apologies for the delay!

Sun and Snow

When we arrived back in the valley today we found that the rain which had fallen on us had fallen as snow high up, so the Half Dome was quite a spectacular sight.

We headed off up the steep ascent to Columbia Rock, a walk up the side of the valley's Northern wall which involves 60 switchback turns and a grueling combination of steps and sandy ground. Thomas impressed us again with his staying power, getting all the way to the lookout and then continuing on to a view of the Upper Yosemite Falls.  

Once we returned to gound level we walked around to the base of the Lower Yosemite Falls before following the valley wall around to the village for more hot chocolate and souvenir buying. While we were in the visitor centre we noticed that the road to the Mariposa grove of sequoias (which had been closed the previous day) had been cleared of snow and opened that morning, which made us rethink our plans for tomorrow.

Feeling recharged, we caught the bus to the Eastern end of the valley and wandered around the mirror lake meadow, spotting deer and squirrels among the mossy rocks. We had dinner at Yosemite Lodge before driving back up to the lookout above Bridal Falls to catch the alpen glow as the sun went down. 

Yosemite!

What a day of rivers, cliffs and waterfalls!

After driving into the valley and saying wow a few times we wandered up to our first waterfall (Bridal Falls) and said wow a few more times. Apparently the flow is about one third of a normal year, but as Canberrans it still seems like a lot of water.

We then stopped in at the visitor's center before catching the shuttle bus around to the start of a walk up the end of the valley to see Vernal and then Nevada falls. Thomas was great - walking up zigs and zags all the way to a lookout 1400 feet above the valley floor. We walked  through snow for part of the way, which made it quite slippery, but the sun was out. We saw plenty of squirrels but thankfully no hungry bears or mountain lions. As we came down the weather changed and it started to rain a little. We were all pretty tired afterwards and enjoyed a hot chocolate back down in the valley.

Across California (on the wrong side of the road)

A slightly sad start to the day as we packed up and waved goodbye to Emma, Eve and Nathaniel. We picked up supplies at the local Trader Joe's supermarket (including our first Twinky for morning tea)...

...and headed West across the mountains. We drove through farmland and orchards, past a pick up truck with its load on fire (!) and through a steep mountain pass to the San Luis reservoir, where we stopped for sandwiches. The reservoir was really low - California is in drought. Thomas was thrilled to discover that there were rattlesnakes in the area, but sadly we couldn't find one. We drove on through the amazingly flat San Joaquin Valley, past nut and fruit trees and wheat fields until the Sierra Nevada mountains began to loom on the horizon. We twisted through the mountains to El Portal and checked into our hotel, which sits overlooking the Merced River. We had a splash in the heated pool, pizza for dinner and went to sleep to the sound of the rapids flowing with snow melt.  

Santa Cruz

We started slower this morning playing and reading at home for a while. Helen and Robert had a chance to try out Emma's Google Glass which was interesting - though not compelling enough for us to order one straight away. Then we packed ourselves into Emma's car again and let her phone guide us over the hills and down to the beach at Santa Cruz.

We started out digging holes, making sand castles and filling our nappies with sand, and then headed for the boardwalk fun fair. Thomas had his first ride on a roller coaster and couldn't stop smiling/whooping afterwards.

After lunch we walked out along the wharf to see the sea lions and seals. We were lucky to see a sea lion leap out of the water onto one of the wharfs lower cross members. We also saw a large group of seals just floating about together at the end of the wharf.

That night we had a picnic dinner in the local park and the kids had a good play on the equipment.

Attack on San Francisco (part two)

Over night the rain continued and the next day was intermittently sunny and wet. Once again we packed everyone into the car and Emma piloted us into San Francisco to catch the cable car from the centre of town to the Fisherman's Wharf. The terrain is amazing - hills so steep you hold your breath in case the car suddenly runs backward, then plunging down the other side like a cautious roller coaster. We wandered along the wharves, stopping to watch bakers  making sour dough bread animals behind a large window. The head baker gave us bread turtles, which kept Nathaniel, Thomas and Eve happily occupied until we found the local sea lion colony basking on pontoons by the wharf. We had fish and chips overlooking the sea lions and ice cream on the wharf before hopping on the V-line street car to return to the city just as the rain came down again.     

Attack on San Francisco (part one)

We headed into San Francisco for the day and started by driving over the bridge. The view here is of us being blown around with the city centre barely visable in the background.

Our next stop was the California Acadamy - which is a science museum with avary and aquarium. They had some HUGE fish, but they asked you not to take photos of them, so this is Eve and Nathanial having lunch instead.

Everyone was pretty tired traveling home, so we put on a Play School CD and some people fell asleep.